


Illuminate

by twokisses



Category: Carry On Series - Rainbow Rowell
Genre: Conversations, Deepavali, Developing Friendships, Diwali, Family, Family Bonding, Festivals, Friendship, Gen, Hinduism, Meet the Family, Mythology References, a.k.a. kick up the ass, because i really wanted to write about my own experiences - so you get sri lankan penny and fam, because in my 'verse of things this is a significant turning point in simon and penny's relationship, ceylonese aunties, ceylonese food, for the purposes of this fic at least hehe, one of the moments that really cemented their bond - their faith and trust in each other, this fic is only on ao3 right now because of a friend's kind (and much-needed) request
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-18
Updated: 2021-03-18
Packaged: 2021-03-27 10:41:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,719
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30121536
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/twokisses/pseuds/twokisses
Summary: After her first long and eventful year of being friends with the Chosen One, Penny brings Simon to her grandmother's house for Deepavali - in the hopes that the festival of lights might help illuminate Simon's strange mood.
Relationships: Penelope Bunce & Simon Snow
Comments: 4
Kudos: 12
Collections: Let It Snow Zine





	Illuminate

**Author's Note:**

> I think the main thing I'd like to clarify before you read this story is the terminology that appears in it. I've been asked why I spell it as 'Deepavali' instead of 'Diwali' - the reason for this will explain lots of other things in this fic. Basically, for my own selfish reasons (of fun), I made Penny and her family Ceylonese (from Sri Lanka) in this fic. I did this simply because that's what I am (well, half) and I just wanted to write my own experiences through Penny and her family. 😂 'Deepavali' is usually the way Sri Lankans and South Indian people spell it, whereas 'Diwali' is the Northern Indian way of spelling it. You'll also see lots of foods/dishes and phrases in the fic below that might be different from what you're used to, for the same reason. (I've also been told that I trolled a lot of people by using lots of Tamil words in this fic with no explanation - sorry lmao.)
> 
> Explanation done, I just want to express my appreciation and gratitude for the [Let It Snow Zine](https://let-it-snow-zine.tumblr.com). (again. I'm sure I've said it lots elsewhere). It was such an honour and a SUPER fun experience being able to write for this lovely zine, and to be in the company of other wonderful creators. It was the perfect cosy treat to have and read in December, and a delight to continue reading since the content was posted on AO3/Tumblr in February! (Of course I'm only posting my fic now, though, like, what else did you expect of me.)
> 
> ANYWAY. Good job if you read my whole author's note. I hope you enjoy reading this fic about young friendship, family connection (arguably the same thing in this case) and long probing conversations about feelings because that's just what I like. ALSO see below the absolutely beautiful artwork my collaborator for the zine, [ech0-draws](https://ech0-draws.tumblr.com), made for the fic. It was such a joy to work with her.

When the Bunce family car turns into the row of houses, Penny’s grandmother’s house appears like a beacon. Hundreds of _diyas_ —little teardrops of clay lamps—have been set out everywhere: along the outer wall and the path to the front door, at the edges of the garden where the grass meets the cement. It’s a dream house, lit up in flickering gold.

Pip immediately starts bouncing in Priya’s lap, clapping with excitement; and in Penny’s periphery, Simon’s mouth falls open.

“Whoa,” he says softly, his cheek practically pressed up to the window. Then, once more with feeling, _“Whoa…”_ as it slowly becomes obvious how many people there are at the party. 

It is a sight. The house is full to overflowing with family. Uncles are standing around with drinks in their hands and kids dart between their legs, trailing balloons and streamers behind them. An abundance of aunties fuss over the food and catch up with each other, laughing loud enough to be heard through the car windows. And everywhere, everyone is in their Deepavali finest. The range of colours is blinding.

Simon looks uncertain.

That doesn’t surprise Penny. He hasn’t done well with big groups of people in the year she’s known him. During their first few weeks at Watford, he hardly opened his mouth (well, to _speak_ , anyway).

But she thought he might need this.

He’s been down, recently. Since the week he slew the dragon, and came back from an especially long meeting with the Mage… And though he wouldn’t tell Penny what the matter was, she’d figured that the literal celebration of light would be just what he needs to get over it. Something vibrant to distract him from the blues.

Mum lines them up for a final clothing inspection before they go in; Penny’s in a _lehenga_ , like her sisters. Her top shimmers incessantly with gold embroidery; and the skirt is only plain until the bottom, where it’s bordered by a five-inch-thick band of sequins. (She tried fighting Mum about it. Tried.) By her right arm, Simon squirms in his own outfit—though Penny thinks it’s unnecessary. He looks wonderful.

“Wow, Simon,” she said earlier, picking him up from Mummers House. “You almost look like a good Ceylonese boy.”

“What does that mean? Is that good?”

“Yes. The aunties will adore you.”

She’s always surprised what a good selection of clothes can do for him, actually. He’s handsome, though you could miss it if you saw him during the summers. The Watford uniform already improves him by miles. (It makes him look cleaner, and taller. Sharper.)

But tonight—in the soft, bright yellow _kurta_ Mum picked out for him—he looks positively angelic. The colour emphasises the gold in his hair—and the blue of his eyes. He looks like a cherub, come to check out the goings-on of Deepavali.

Mum finds a reason to tweak his collar, then they’re allowed to go in. To be immediately swallowed up into the maw of the huge living entity that is a Ceylonese family gathering. 

Penny and Simon get attacked by the older cousins first—a whole gaggle of girls. Much less boisterous in their greetings this year, which Penny knows is because of Simon. (They’re absolutely mad for white boys.) Geetha keeps shooting demure looks at him from under her lashes; and Yasotha asks if they’re _boyfriend and girlfriend_. Penny makes a disgusted noise. Simon blushes. Geetha’s eyelashes move a bit more violently.

Penny grabs Simon by the arm and marches him into the house.

She’s in search of her grandma. (Anyone who doesn’t greet her upon arriving is asking for a good sounding.) Simon follows dutifully. And though they do get accosted by several aunties along the way— _“Penelope, you’re so big now! You look so beautiful!”_ _“Oh, what a_ handsome _boy!”_ —they somehow make it to the back of the house in one piece.

And they find Grandma there! She’s in the kitchen, expertly making several metal _koles_ of masala tea.

“Happy Deepavali, Grandma,” Penny says—regretting it the moment it leaves her mouth.

“‘Grandma’, is it?” says the fearsome matriarch of the household. She turns to raise her eyebrows at Penny. She’s tiny—shorter than Penny—but she could make Penny feel like a child at forty. “What did I tell you about calling me that?”

“Happy Deepavali, Ammamma,” Penny says bashfully. She sees Simon looking at her with interest and clears her throat, trying to straighten herself. But Grandma has already taken her face in her hands, pulling her down to place a kiss on her forehead. It’s not a normal kiss. It’s the Ceylonese-Grandma-version: one long, violent inhale against the forehead with no actual lip-contact. Simon’s face is a picture.

“Happy Deepavali, Penelope. And who’s this young man?”

“This is my friend, Simon.”

“Simon Snow, hm?” Grandma sizes him up and down, hands on hips; and Simon offers her a tiny, terrified smile.

“Happy Deepavali, auntie,” he says.

She regards him slowly. Seconds that feel like eons. Then, as suddenly as the sun emerging from behind clouds, her expression cracks into one of pure love. Simon’s head is being pulled down to her mouth before he knows it, and Penny nearly loses it this time. He’s a man fearing for his life.

“Happy Deepavali, darling,” Grandma says warmly. She pulls back to look him right in the eyes and gives him one short, firm shake by the arms. That smile she has on has always been the sturdiest thing Penny’s ever seen—and one she thought was reserved for grandchildren. 

But there it is, for Simon. Like he’s one of her own. And Simon… Penny can’t begin to describe what emerges on his face. Softened surprised? Like he’s lost his footing in unknown terrain, but found himself in a place too lovely to be real. Penny decides not to think too much about it, because she knows him—and she knows it would just break her heart.

Grandma pats him briskly on the back. “Go and eat, ya? Try the _sothi_ with the _idiyappam_. I made those. Penelope will show you.”

The moment passes, in light of the prospect of eating. Simon’s eyes go big, and Penny scoffs, nodding toward the food table. Grandma releases him.

On the way out, Simon asks, “What’s _sothi_ and _idi_ —what are those?”

“Traditional Sri Lankan dishes,” Penny says. “You’ll die when you taste it. There’s nothing like Grandma’s _sothi_.”

“You mean _Ammamma’s sothi_.”

“Take a plate, Simon.”

—

Penny was right. Being here has been _wonderful_ for Simon. A half hour later, his _kurta_ is straining over his tummy, several aunties have tried to set him up with their pretty daughters, and her _little_ cousins have taken to him like fish to water. They keep clinging to his legs and dragging him around for games and firecrackers and _kolam_ -decorating. Simon is flushed and sweaty, but he looks happy.

He looks like another part of the family.

The imps only let him go once their favourite part of Deepavali rolls around—story time. Grandma, the narrator, sits in the middle of the living room, and the kids array themselves in a semi-circle on the floor around her. Simon and Penny go for an empty spot on the stairs, and are just settling in when Grandma begins her first tale. The _Ramayana_. It’s one of the legends people celebrate on Deepavali day—an epic tale of good over evil, light over darkness. She tells it every year, but no one ever gets tired of it. ( _“Your_ ammamma _could stop two armies fighting with her storytelling,”_ Penny’s mum would say.) 

She begins with flair:

There was a brave and righteous prince named Rama, who was exiled from his kingdom for 14 years. During this time, the evil king of the _rakshasas_ abducted Rama’s wife and took her to his kingdom on the island of Lanka. Rama, raising an army, built a bridge _across_ the ocean to find his wife again and inflict vengeance on the evil king…

At this point, one of the baby cousins—one of Simon’s little admirers, it seems—interrupts Grandma to say, “Like Simon!”

Penny blinks, surprised. Hardly a pause later, the other children join in like a discordant choir: “Like Simon! Simon!”

Simon looks taken aback.

“Yes!” one little girl—Shobha—says excitedly. “Simon is a hero! He’s going to defeat the evil king!”

“The _Humdrum_ ,” another toddler yells.

“Well—that is what the prophecies say,” Grandma says gently. “But—”

“Simon has _superpowers_ , like Lord Rama,” says one of the boys.

“Super _magic_ ,” says another.

“He’s strong!”

“And brave!”

“He’ll save us from the evil Humdrum!”

Penny laughs, looking back at Simon—expecting amusement or bashfulness on his face. They _are_ there. But what she wasn’t prepared to see was hesitance, as well, twitching at the corner of his mouth. Uncertainty. He looks as if he’s been reminded of something unpleasant.

Around the room, her aunts and uncles are shushing their children, telling them to pay attention to the story. Yet breathless murmurs of “Simon Snow” and “the hero” linger among their wake. And elsewhere, other adults have begun to stir. Penny sees aunties covering their mouths to whisper to their neighbours, hears snatches of conversation along the lines of, “can’t control his magic,” “still young,” “enough training?” _“goes off”_ —

Beside her, even that hesitant smile is gone. Replaced now by a hard, flat line. Simon’s shoulders have drawn up, and his head is bent low. When she touches him, his arm is tense as a wire.

So while the kids are back to being distracted by Grandma’s story, Penny takes him by the arm and tugs him up the stairs.

She sees him startle, then become confused. But he follows anyway. (After making it through two puzzles and a dragon together, there must be enough trust between them for questions to be unnecessary.) On the second floor, she turns left into a room she knows will be empty, and immediately shuts the two of them into it.

It’s her Grandma’s room. Penny used to spend ages in here as a toddler… playing on the floor or being patted to sleep by Grandma in her bed. The bed hasn’t changed—neither has the wooden almirah in the corner. Or the shelf _by_ the bed, where Grandma’s little altar still sits. A couple of prayer items and a few pictures of Hindu deities make up its entirety.

Simon is staring at it. He turns when Penny steps closer.

“Are we allowed in here?” he asks. His voice is small. Hushed.

“Yeah… I used to come in here all the time. Ammamma will be fine with it.”

He nods. Then he looks at the floor, at the hem of his _kurta_ that he’s absentmindedly rubbing between his fingers—then back at the altar.

“Who—” he says, gesturing at the assembled gods. Penny takes another step toward the altar and briefly forms a _namaskaram_ with her hands, lowering her head. Not praying, exactly—acknowledging. Then she points out the pictures to Simon and tells him the names: Lord Ganesha, Goddess Lakshmi, Lord Rama with his family.

The last seems to draw Simon’s attention most. Penny looks at him as he looks at the picture.

“Are you okay?” she asks quietly.

He shrugs.

“Do you want to sit?”

He nods. So they sit on the floor together, shoulder-to-shoulder, their backs against Ammamma’s bed. There’s a framed baby picture of Penny’s mum hanging on the opposite wall. She stares at it for a long time before Simon utters a word.

“Sometimes,” he says, “it’s… a lot.”

“What is?” She looks at him. Still inscrutable. “Being Chosen?”

He nods.

“Why?”

“Are you really asking me that?”

She nudges his knee. “Just tell me.”

“ _Because,_ Penny. I’m shit at it.”

“You’re not—” He gives her a look. She sighs. “Okay, fine. But you’ve only been here a year—”

“That’s a long time.”

“—and even normal magickal children aren’t proficient at twelve!”

“ _You_ are.”

“I’m an exceptional case.”

 _“Exactly,”_ he says. “You’re _good_ , and you’re normal.”

“What?”

“I mean, there aren’t even any prophecies about you! … _Merlin,_ I sound like a dick.”

“No… I get it. Go on.”

He sighs—deeply—and sinks further down the bed frame. “It’s just… when the Mage used to talk to me about all this… this Chosen One business, it didn’t sound real, you know? It sounded like _adult_ things. Like how adults tell you you have to do taxes one day, but who cares? Because you don’t have to do them _now_.”

“I’m following.”

“So when it becomes real… and someone starts talking about you paying their taxes—or, I mean—”

“Just—stop using the taxes analogy.”

He huffs a laugh. A weak one. “When your best friend’s baby cousins start saying you’re gonna _save_ them, from the most terrifying thing to exist in mage history…” Penny feels the breath leave her, quietly, and Simon says, “Yeah.”

“What happened, Simon?” she asks. “With the Mage last week.”

He exhales, hard. “He wanted to know how I defeated the dragon.”

“And?”

“And I couldn’t tell him! Because I didn’t _know_. Because I wasn’t controlling anything… You saw. How I—blew.”

She did see—how Simon completely blinked out of existence behind his own eyes, surrendering to power she hadn’t imagined could be contained within one mage before. How the fire seemed to eat the dragon from the inside out…

His voice is soft as he says, “I didn’t mean to kill it.”

“You didn’t have a choice.”

“Maybe,” he says doubtfully.

Penny looks at him. Sitting near the foot of her Grandma’s old altar, hunched as if in its shadow.

“Simon. You don’t have to be a god.”

He frowns at the floor.

“They’re _toddlers_ ,” she says. “They don’t even know what they’re saying. It’s not like the whole of Magickal Britain elected them our representatives. Hey.” She takes his hand in hers—and it surprises him. But when she squeezes, he gives her a light squeeze back.

“No one expects you to take the Humdrum down on your own,” she says. “Even Rama had an army! And you have me.”

“A whole army.”

“Hey, I’m good in a fight.”

He smiles, like he’s trying not to. Penny grins.

“You have _me_ , _and_ every other magician. We’re all soldiers—isn’t that what the Mage always says? … We just needed a little hope at first, to actually fight. To try. You gave us that.”

“How?”

“By getting here at all! Simon, the _entire magickal world_ woke up when you went off the first time. You gave everyone hope just by being _real_.”

“And now?”

“Now—” Penny pushes at his hand. “You try.”

“And that’s… enough?” he asks.

“It will be,” she says. “When it’s time for whatever happens… it will be. You just have to believe it and carry on. What else can _anyone_ do? … The rest is a waste of energy to think about.”

And finally—her words fall into a silence. It’s a small silence, and a close one—full of Simon’s quiet contemplation. She lets him be, and just holds his hand. His eyes linger there for ages.

But when he finally raises them to her own, they’re a clear, steady blue.

“You should be a motivational speaker,” he says.

Penny laughs before she can help it. And Simon’s face breaks into its own grin, dimples appearing like surprise gifts in his cheeks. It always makes her happy to see them.

“Mum always said it’s the Ceylonese blood in me. We never stop talking, so it’d better be good for something.”

“Figures,” he says, and Penny leans into him. Turns her head so she can rest her cheek on his shoulder. He’s not usually fond of hugging, but it must be what he needs right now, because the next moment, she feels _his_ cheek on her hair.

Downstairs, the party audibly continues. Penny hears laughter and cheers, popping firecrackers, somebody’s voice carrying above the others’: “Happy Deepavali!” Her family, celebrating the age-old triumph of good over evil. Light over darkness.

And upstairs, Simon Snow strokes his thumb over hers and whispers the word “hope” into the room, in a way that makes it sound like a promise.

It sounds right.

[](https://ibb.co/QjtCrc5)

**Author's Note:**

> thank you for reading. you can also find me on [tumblr](https://twokisses.tumblr.com).


End file.
